Rem Rieder: Obama should widen access to media

Apr. 4, 2013
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Rem Rieder, USA TODAY columnist. / USA TODAY

by Rem Rieder, USA TODAY

by Rem Rieder, USA TODAY

Conservatives are fond of depicting journalists as totally smitten by President Obama.

If that's the case, this has got to be one of the most one-sided romances in history.

The relationship between the Obama administration and the press corps has been contentious from the get-go. Journalists complain about a disturbing lack of access to the president.

Of course, jousting between the White House and reporters is nothing new. But the Obama administration seems to be setting new standards for freezing out the news media.

"The way the president's availability to the press has shrunk in the last two years is a disgrace," ABC News White House reporter Ann Compton told Politico.

"The president's day-to-day policy development - on immigration, on guns - is almost totally opaque to the reporters trying to do a responsible job of covering it. There are no readouts from big meetings he has with people from the outside, and many of them aren't even on his schedule. This is different from every president I covered. This White House goes to extreme lengths to keep the press away."

Compton has a little perspective: Obama is the seventh president she has covered.

Martha Joynt Kumar, a political science professor at Towson University in Maryland, keeps track of the relationship between presidents and the news media for a living. One stat she compiled is especially revealing.

An important tool for journalists monitoring an administration is the short question-and-answer session with the president after events in settings such as the Oval Office. These opportunities provide real-time insights into a president's views on the issues of the moment. George W. Bush, rarely ranked as an ardent friend of the news media, had 354 of them during his first term. Obama, who famously promised that his would be the most transparent administration ever: 107.

The Obama administration is deep-freezing the news media because it can. It's nothing new for administrations to try to control the narrative. But Obama is the first president to serve in the Age of Twitter. With extensive use of its Whitehouse.gov website and its fluency on social media, the administration can get its message out on its own terms, bypassing the middlemen and women.

Obama and his acolytes have made manifestly clear their disdain for the media's focus on the trivial, on the latest flap or the gaffe du jour, at the expense of shedding light on serious issues. In fairness, they may be onto something. But that's no excuse for cutting off the conversation.

Obama, according to Kumar's stats, also held fewer press conferences in his first term than his three immediate predecessors, although he held more solo press conferences than George W. Bush. Obama has trounced them when it comes to granting interviews. However, he has done it in a way that reflects his determination to do it his way.

While ignoring outlets such as The New York Times and The Washington Post whose correspondents are well-versed in national and international issues, Obama often has turned to regional reporters and TV celebrities who are less likely to challenge him. His go-to interviewer has been Steve Kroft of CBS' 60 Minutes. Despite the program's hard-hitting reputation, Kroft's questions in his last interview were so lame that characterizing them as "softball" would be an unfair slur to the sport.

Why is any of this a big deal? Isn't this just inside baseball about a bunch of whiny journalists unhappy that they aren't getting their way?

Not at all. The American people have a right to know what their president is thinking about important issues of the day. They shouldn't have to wait weeks and weeks for a formal press conference to find out. They shouldn't have to settle for propaganda from the White House's Obama image-enhancement shop.

In some ways, the interaction between the Obama administration and the press "is a pretty traditional adversarial relationship," says New York Times White House correspondent Peter Baker. The big change, says Baker, who has covered the last three presidents, "is the death of pool sprays," as those brief encounters with the president are called.

"That means we don't get regular interaction with the president," Baker says. "He goes weeks without being asked about a lot of stuff that Bush or Clinton would be asked about."

That's a bad thing because? "It's important that people know what the president is thinking when North Korea is rattling its sabers," Baker says.

Actually, mixing it up with the press could pay dividends for Obama, Baker says. "None of the people around him will challenge him or force him to confront unpleasant truths," he says. "That's a role we have served. It helps a president to be forced to respond. It clarifies thinking."

Kumar thinks one reason Obama avoids those short Q&As is because they are, well, short. "The questions are often about unfolding events," she says. "The president likes to have lots of information before he speaks. As a professor and a lawyer, he likes to put in all the buts and wherefores."

But she, too, thinks Obama is missing an opportunity. Responding to questions "shows you're on top of it," she says. "It's an opportunity to respond to critics." Plus, "answering questions is part of presidential leadership."

In 2009, when then-White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters, "This is the most transparent administration in the history of our country," the White House press corps erupted in laughter, Politico reported at the time.

It's not too late for Obama to jettison his wrongheaded approach and let some sunlight in. But don't bet heavily that that's going to happen.

Rieder is editor and senior vice president of American Journalism Review.